Poetry by Natalie Eleanor Patterson

    Justine M CC



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Portrait of the Body with Blood Rising 

Even now           remnants of that life settle
like evidence                     on the ash field of my body: 

dog hair on the breast   of my blouse
gray cascade of fur         from my anemic throat

hunger like a sheet that can’t be lifted
rusted                  with a mottled stain
 
Even now there is longing         that violet
contusion of desire        pressed red in the mirror

your little finger snaking inside me like a hollow knife
& bruising my hard blood          into softness

cutting a little slit                          in my belly
& licking your tongue to the eggs        in bright clusters

& rising from between my legs             like a bloody sun
over the halflit field       your teeth stained

a red so close to black 





My Baby 

                                                                                                                                                                                      My baby wears all black
                                                                                                                                    says that we both die inside of every dream he has
                                                                                                                                                                                       —Nicole Dollanganger 

My baby poses with a semi-automatic
calls me baby     but not like that 

My baby drives drunk on the third date
my eyes fixed on the road          as if it would steady her

My baby in the chemical solvent of morning
rising & falling like a dirty sheet over our unmade bed

The smell of her underarms sharp & beautiful
& terrifying      like the bile that lingers in my mouth

My baby in my dream lifts a semi truck
& tosses it at me like     it’s nothing

Hand on my neck like a dull blade
thick with rust & fur 

I tucked away my tremble
to make peace with       my baby

My baby says you make me feel like
a child                  molester 

My baby says I don’t have
that gun    anymore 

Violence never touched me but it lived with us
in her history                   in the animals too

waking in the acid dawn with a dog-
bruise on my breast 

I hate you like a gin baby hates its mother
which is to say I love you             & I wish you dead 

My baby says I’ll take care of you
My baby says I look at you & almost see

a child 





A Red Bruise Shaped Like a Bird 

                                                                                                                                                                    after a line by Emily Skaja

In our closest moments                            the wall between us 
only ever thinned          to a membrane

the waxwing casing                      of your stomach lining
red light shining through                           like a bruise

In the topography of Real Life                we’re always eating breakfast
& when I sleep                I’m never not dreaming

the phantasm of your face        a right version of you

In our closest moments                              my hair crumpled
like wet Kleenex             sickness gathered like frost 

on a windowpane           dirt gathered 
like sickness      under your fingernails 

In the view from here                    I’m drawing lines
around everything    that’s fallen out of the story

Who was it that said               the way we are
is the way                       we love? 

In a memory of Real Life        or a dream
an injured rabbit          frees itself from the trap

only by luring                another animal in
to take its place                           among the torn-up trees




Natalie Eleanor Patterson is a poet, editor, and instructor with an MFA in poetry from Oregon State University. She is the author of the chapbook Plainhollow (dancing girl press, 2022) and the editor of Dream of the River (Jacar Press, 2021), and has work featured in Sinister Wisdom, CALYX, South Florida Poetry Journal, and elsewhere. She is Managing Editor of Jacar Press and a PhD student in poetry. Find her at poetnatalie.com.
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